Bokor Hill Station - A French Ghost Town in Cambodia

Bokor Hill Station is a French ghost town in Preah Monivong National Park, southern Cambodia. Construction started in 1921 on Dâmrei Mountains, about 20 km as the crow flies West from the town of Kampot.

The town was built as a resort by the colonial French settlers to offer an escape from the heat, humidity and general insalubrity of Phnom Penh. Nine hundred lives were lost in nine months during the construction of the resort in this remote mountain location.

The centrepiece of the resort was the grand Bokor Palace Hotel & Casino, complemented by shops, a post office, a church and the Royal Apartments. It is also an important cultural site, showing how the colonial settlers spent their free time.

Bokor Hill was abandoned first by the French in late 1940s, during the First Indochina War, because of local insurrections guided by the Khmer Issarak, and then for good in 1972, as Khmer Rouge took over the area. During the Vietnamese invasion in 1979, Khmer Rouge entrenched themselves and held on tightly for months. In earlier 1990s Bokor Hill was still one of the last strongholds of Khmer Rouge.

Now abandoned, with the exception of the old post office, most of the buildings are still standing. The strategic importance of the location is underlined by the fact that the Cambodian authorities maintain a Ranger Station on the site. The only other "inhabited" building on the site is a small temple. There is also a waterfall which tends to be dry in high season and in full flow during rainy season. About 10 km before on the way for Bokor Hill Station there is the Black Palace (Veang Khmao). It was a little summer palace of King Sihanouk, abandoned some decade ago.

The site is owned by the government but is now under 99–year lease to the Sokimex Group who are undertaking to relay the road and redevelop the site, repairing the old hotel and casino along with new buildings. The project was announced on Jan 19th 2008, road construction is underway. The subsequent re-development is budgeted over the next 15 years after which a further application may be submitted to create a larger Bokor city, the plans for which are unknown. 

Sources: wikipedia, asiaobscura